Liam O’Connor, author of The Sailor and the Seamstress, on how a book emerged from serendipity and childhood tales.
May 21st 2026 was an exciting day for me. My book, The Sailor and the Seamstress, the story of my great-grandparents, William Kennedy and Norry Grady, appeared on the shelves of bookstores across Ireland. I never, ever imagined that such a thing would happen for me until just over a year ago when Patrick O’Donoghue, Commissioning Editor at Gill Books, emailed me to say that Gill was interested in publishing my manuscript. It is difficult to describe accurately my reaction to that correspondence.
I never set out to write a book nor was it ever an ambition of mine to be a writer. Creative writing was never regarded as my forte, not by me, and certainly not by my teachers. My efforts at essays in English classes during my school years never elicited high praise, nor indeed any kind of praise!
Real People in Real Events
However, I had always loved listening to stories, not about fictional characters but about real people in real events and situations. Thus, my reading habits always gravitated towards history. Listening to such stories always had me trying to picture these real people and the times in which they lived. This was, for me, more than adequate stimulation of my imagination.
I first heard of William and Norry from my grandmother, Nora Dillon, who was known to her grandchildren as Mom. I have a memory from when I was about four years old of staring up at a large photograph that was hanging on a wall in her home on Green Street in Dingle. As I stared it seemed to me that the very serious-looking man and woman in the photograph were staring back at me. The man had a full, snow-white beard and his chest was bedecked with four shiny medals. The woman sported a turban-like headdress along with a sort of neckerchief that was similar to what John Wayne used to wear when playing the part of a US Cavalry officer.
The Sailor and the Seamstress
With growing curiosity I went and asked my grandmother because I was sure that if anyone could throw light on their identity it would be her. That was the day she began the storytelling that eventually led to The Sailor and the Seamstress.
There I was back in 1964, a dyed-in-the-wool native of Dingle – or so I thought – and Mom telling me that her parents were from County Cork! She said that her father was from a place called Aghada while her mother came from near Macroom. The medals on her dad’s jacket were the result of his years of service in the Royal Navy and Coastguard and that it was this career that had brought him, Norry, and their children to West Kerry where he retired in 1884, the year my grandmother was born, and the year they settled in Dingle to finally put down roots.
Mom’s tales of her father’s adventures in seas and oceans all over the globe ignited in me a sense of wonder and a life-long curiosity in this ordinary couple who lived their lives during some extraordinary times in history. It was in these bedtime and fireside stories that I first heard of the Baltic and the Crimea, Hong Kong, Singapore, Valparaiso and Vancouver Island. Mom also told me about her eight siblings, some of whom she never knew because they had died before she, the youngest, was born. In the years following her death in 1966, the storytelling was continued by her daughter, Lila, my dearest aunt, and her delivery was just as impactful on my young mind as Mom’s had been.
The Family Bible
A few years later when I had acquired sufficient reading skills, Lila directed me to the family bible wherein were listed all of Willliam and Norry’s children, along with their dates of birth, and also, sadly, their dates of death, some of them tragically early in life. My font of information was added to on another day while exploring in the attic of the house on Green Street. In a dusty storage chest I discovered an old document which was William’s Royal Navy service record. This treasure listed all of the ships he had served on and when. Oh, if only it could have told me more but for now I delighted in knowing that William had served on ships named Gorgon, Dauntless, Melville, Calcutta and Topaze.
The business of growing up soon took over my attention. By 1980 I was beginning my career as a primary school teacher in St Fiachra’s in Beaumont on Dublin’s northside. Actually deciding on a teaching career and then ending up in St Fiachra’s had some curious twists and turns, some ‘sliding doors’ moments, you could say. Anyway, on the very first day of my new career there was another teacher who was, like myself, just newly-qualified. After a few weeks of pleasant conversations we began dating. Her name was Frances Daly. She was from Cork, from a place called Aghada – what were the chances of that!
Imagination Run Riot
Perhaps my imagination began to run riot but a feeling began to grow inside of me that somehow, and for some unknown reason, the past was reaching out to my present which, in turn, was going to play some role in my future. Looking back, I think that the extraordinary serendipity of the woman I went on to marry in 1984 being from the same place as the ancestor whose story had fascinated my childhood somehow relit the flame of interest in those childhood tales. From there followed many years of research into the lives of William and Norry which all eventually led to Patrick O’Donoghue emailing me in April 2025.
Residing as I now am in the parish of Aghada in the east of the county of Cork I cannot help the feeling – a quite peaceful one – that a part of William Kennedy has returned to his native soil. Maybe the past did actually reach out to me all those years ago!
(c) Liam O’Connor
About The Sailor and the Seamstress by Liam O’Connor:
When William Kennedy joined the Royal Navy in 1854, he embarked on a decade-long service that took him across the globe, from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea, the Far East and the Pacific. Meanwhile Norry Grady emerged from the hardships of the Famine to become a domestic servant in Trabolgan House, where her skills as a seamstress did not go unnoticed.
The couple married in 1859 and eventually settled into life in coastguard stations across Ireland and England. Their lives were marked by joy, sorrow and resilience as they navigated personal losses with an indomitable spirit that has echoed down through the generations, all the way to the author.
The Sailor and the Seamstress is a vivid historical narrative that paints a rich portrait of nineteenth-century Ireland, a time of great social and political upheaval, capturing the struggles and triumphs of ordinary people during extraordinary times.
Order your copy of The Sailor and the Seamstress online here.
And read more Meet the Author articles on Writing.ie here.
